Week Eleven Recap

Week eleven was brutal and resulted in my worst week of the season. After correctly picking the Miami Dolphins over the Buffalo Bills on Thursday night, it was all downhill from there. In the early Sunday games, only one favored team, the San Francisco 49ers, won, much less covered. For the week, had you taken the underdog in every game, your record would have been 9-5.

As favored teams also tend to be the more efficient teams, as measured by most of the metrics I consider from week to week, I took a beating, going 2-4 from last week’s column, 4-9 overall, and falling back to 46% for the season against the spread.

After eleven weeks of football, it seems safe to say that, other than maybe the New England Patriots or the Green Bay Packers, the team you saw last week almost assuredly won’t be the team you see this week.

Teams that had looked bad recently, but won last week included: the Chicago Bears, the Cincinnati Bengals, and the Houston Texans. Obviously, the Denver Broncos loss to the St. Louis Rams was a shocker, as were lopsided losses by the Philadelphia Eagles to the Green Bay Packers and by the Indianapolis Colts to the New England Patriots. The Tennessee Titans kept it close to cover at home against the Pittsburgh Steelers. And, good lord, Washington can’t even beat the Tampa Bay Buccaneers at home?

Closer to home, the NFC West went 3-1, with only the Seattle Seahawks losing, but not surprisingly, on the road at Kansas City. And, as crazy as it may seem, after beating the Detroit Lions in one of the few games I got right, the Arizona Cardinals can just about wrap up the division this week with a win in Seattle.

Picking Methodology

While I’m tempted to just flip a coin this week, I’m going to stay the course in this season long experiment and consider weighted Defense-adjusted Value Over Average (DVOA), absolute point differential, and QBR.

While I love the Elo rating system used over at FiveThirtyEight, it isn’t always published in time to be a reference, as is the case this week, so I’m going to substitute results against the spread for this season as a fourth metric.

For a further explanation of DVOA, go to Football Outsiders.

This Week’s Picks

This week, as usual, I’ll be looking at the NFC West, as well as the Sunday night and Monday night games. For all of my picks, you can go to ESPN’s Pig Skin Pick’em. I’m Brian Hight’s OSN Picks in the Fans of the Seattle Seahawks (spread) group.

St. Louis (4-6) at San Diego (6-4) -5.5

Ah, the St. Louis Rams, with wins over the Seattle Seahawks, the San Francisco 49ers, and the Denver Broncos. And, upon closer inspection, the week one loss to the Minnesota Vikings is the only bad loss. All their other losses are to potential playoff teams – Dallas, Philadelphia, San Francisco, Kansas City, and Arizona. I’m beginning to think Jeff Fisher’s team isn’t all that bad.

On the other hand, the San Diego Chargers, after losing three in a row to Kansas City, Denver, and Miami, could only manage to beat the winless Oakland Raiders at home by seven, 13-6. They seem like a team headed the wrong direction.

Only 5.8% separates the two teams in efficiency, with St. Louis ranked 22^nd in weighted DVOA at -9.6% and San Diego ranked 18^th at -3.8%.

The point differential weighs heavily in San Diego’s favor with a +26 on the season compared to St. Louis’ -73, but the +26 is actually kind of low for a 6 win team.

QBR goes to Phillip Rivers and the Chargers at 80.6 to Shaun Hill’s 52.2. Even with their struggles of late, the Chargers still rank 9^th in overall offensive efficiency, but the Rams are improving, up now to 18^th in offensive DVOA.

The Chargers are 2-3 against the spread (ATS) when favored this season, and have either lost or failed to cover the last three in a row. The Rams, who have played a rough schedule, are 4-5 as underdogs ATS, including 3-3 the last six weeks.

I think the Chargers should probably win this game, but given that they could only beat the 0-10 Raiders by 7, I’m going to take the 5.5 and pick the Rams.

Pick – St. Louis Rams

Arizona (9-1) at Seattle (6-4) -6.5

It’s really not that hyperbolic to say that the Seattle Seahawks season may be on the line Sunday when the Arizona Cardinals come to town. A loss would drop them to 6-5 with just four days to prepare for the 49ers in San Francisco on Thanksgiving. Their last four games are then at Philadelphia, home against San Francisco, at Arizona, and then back home against St. Louis. Seattle must win out at home and steal at least one game on the road to hope to make the playoffs, and the odyssey begins Sunday.

The Seahawks are the more efficient of the two teams battling Sunday, ranked 7^th in overall weighted DVOA with 12.2% compared to the Cardinals who rank 15^th at 4.6%, for a differential of 7.6%.

The matchup of the Seahawks 6^th ranked offense versus the Cardinals 6^th ranked defense should be the most intriguing to watch. And more specifically, Seattle’s number one ranked running game against Arizona’s number three ranked rush defense should determine the outcome of the game.

Arizona holds an edge in point differential, +61 to +45, which is to be expected with three more wins.

What isn’t as obvious is that in a fairly small sample size of four starts, Drew Stanton has a higher QBR than Russell Wilson (68.3 to 60.5). Stanton’s only loss this season came on the road at Denver in early October. It will be interesting to see how Stanton reacts to the noise level at Century Link Field.

So far this season, the Seahawks are 4-5 ATS when favored, while the Cardinals are 3-1 ATS as underdogs.

If the Seahawks are to stay in the playoff discussion, they must win this game. I think they will, but I’m also anticipating a low scoring, close game, so I’ll gladly take the 6.5 and pick Arizona to cover.

Pick – Arizona Cardinals

Washington (3-7) at San Francisco (6-4) -8.5

If we operate under the assumption that the team you saw last week isn’t the team you’ll see this week, then I guess Washington will win this game.  But, how can you pick a team coming off consecutive losses to the Minnesota Vikings and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers?

My only reservation is the 8.5 points. San Francisco has a -1 point differential for the season, which is pretty hard to do and have a winning record. But Washington is -52.

In terms of efficiency, the 49ers hold a 29.1% edge (7.3% to -21.8%). By far the biggest matchup advantage is San Francisco’s 4^th ranked defense against Washington’s 21^st ranked offense. But both teams are terrible on special teams (29^th and 30^th), so there’s no telling what kind of weird bounces could shape the outcome.

But, with superior defense and an adequate quarterback (Colin Kaepernick’s QBR is 54.9 compared to Robert Griffin III’s 34.2), the 49ers should win easily.

San Francisco is 5-3 ATS when favored, but Washington is 3-2 ATS as underdogs. Still I’m going to take the 49ers.

Pick – San Francisco 49ers

Dallas (7-3) -3.5 at NY Giants (3-7)

If this wasn’t a division rivalry and I was only looking at statistics and not who the teams were, I’d hardly give this a second thought. Take Dallas. Next game? But, it is a division rivalry and the Dallas Cowboys have shown they are perfectly capable of losing to the lowly in the NFC East with a week eight, overtime loss, at home to Washington, 20-17. Still, every metric points to a Cowboys win.

Dallas ranks 12^th in weighted DVOA with 6.0%. The New York football Giants rank 25^th with -13.9%. Dallas is better on both sides of the ball, with a substantial advantage on offense, ranked 8^th, going against the Giants defense that ranks 22^nd.

There is a 107 point differential between the two teams. Dallas is +49, while New York is -58.

And, Eli Manning’s propensity to throw passes to the other team has started to catch up with his QBR, down now to 64.0. Tony Romo, when healthy, is just below the elite in the league with a 78.9 QBR.

Dallas’ record of 3-3 ATS when favored isn’t that persuasive, but New York’s 1-6 ATS as an underdog sure is. I’m going to take Dallas and Giants fans can thank me in advance of their team’s upset win Sunday night.

Pick – Dallas Cowboys

Baltimore (6-4) at New Orleans (4-6) -3.5

Going into their three game home stand, the 4-4 New Orleans Saints looked poised to seize control of the NFC South. After all, they had won 11 straight in the Super Dome. Three weeks and two losses later, a 4-6 Saints team finds themselves in second place behind the Atlanta Falcons by virtue of an overtime loss in Atlanta in week one and desperately in need of a win to keep pace with…

Wait a minute. Six wins might win the NFC South. Never mind.

The Baltimore Ravens are coming off a bye and should be eager to set the pace down the stretch in the AFC North where every team has a winning record and every team could legitimately win the division.

The Ravens rank 3^rd in weighted DVOA with 23.3% and hold a 20.1% advantage over a Saints team that ranks 16^th with 3.2%. The more efficient offense belongs to the Saints (5^th), but the Ravens have the more efficient defense (7^th). But as good as New Orleans is on offense, they are just as bad on defense, ranked 30^th. A 12^th ranked Baltimore offense should be adequate to score a lot of points against the New Orleans.

Drew Brees, while looking shaky the past few weeks, still maintains a 73.6 QBR. As Joe Flacco’s strength tends to be managing the ball and taking a couple of deep shots per game, his QBR is lower than Brees’ at 63.7.

The record this season doesn’t help much in this matchup, as Baltimore is 0-2 ATS when they are underdogs and New Orleans is 2-7 ATS when favored.

With the Super Dome’s mystical winning properties seemingly diminished, I’m going to have to take the more efficient team.

Pick – Baltimore Ravens

Summing it Up

Did I really just take four out of five road teams? I have a feeling week 12 could be even more rocky than week 11.

Have fun and enjoy the games.